Abstract

Sex offenders are required to register and notify their movement in the United States. In Brazos County, Texas, the child safety zone is within 1,000 feet of premises--such as schools, day-care facilities, playgrounds and parks, etc.--where children generally gather. A GIS can be a useful tool to map the locations of these offenders spatially. This study creates a Web-based tool for the law enforcement officers to locate the offenders residing in, o, or within the child safety zone in the Brazos County, Texas. The Department of Public Safety currently lists 164 sex offenders in the zip codes of Brazos County. Spatial query from the maps generated showed that about 55.41 percent of the offenders resided in the Child Safety Zone. Furthermore, Critical Risk Zones (CRZ) was created for each offender to show locations of immediate and lateral risk that overlap the Child Safety Zone.